because we could fail due to a small buffer and loop and rerun. If this
happens, then the vsnprintf() will have already taken the arguments off
the va_list. For i386 and others, this doesn't matter because the
va_list type is a passed as a copy. But on powerpc and amd64, this is
fatal because the va_list is a reference to an external structure that
keeps the vararg state due to the more complicated argument passing system.
On amd64, arguments can be passed as follows:
First 6 int/pointer type arguments go in registers, the rest go on
the memory stack.
Float and double are similar, except using SSE registers.
long double (80 bit precision) are similar except using the x87 stack.
Where the 'next argument' comes from depends on how many have been
processed so far and what type it is. For amd64, gcc keeps this state
somewhere that is referenced by the va_list.
I found a description that showed the va_copy was required here:
http://mirrors.ccs.neu.edu/cgi-bin/unixhelp/man-cgi?va_end+9
The single unix spec doesn't mention va_copy() at all.
Anyway, the problem was that the sysctl kern.geom.conf* nodes would panic
due to walking off the end of the va_arg lists in vsnprintf. A better fix
would be to have sbuf_vprintf() use a single pass and call kvprintf()
with a callback function that stored the results and grew the buffer
as needed.
Approved by: re (scottl)
a9a0bbad19